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The following excerpt is from Robert W. Bly’s book The Digital Marketing Handbook. Buy it now from Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks | IndieBound
Let’s review how you can use direct mail (self-mailers and postcards), conventions, meet-ups and trade shows, and TV and radio spots to grow your email list. But first, an unexpected offline list-building strategy: cold-calling.
Cold-Calling
Nobody likes the idea of calling someone out of the blue. Bear with me for a moment: This strategy costs you nothing but time (or a bit of cash if you hire a virtual assistant to do the calling for you). It requires knowing the name of the individual you’d like as a subscriber and a short script:
“Hi, this is Sarah from ABC Company. I have an important email to send to Mr. Bill Bower. Would you mind connecting me with him to get his permission to send it?”
If that doesn’t get you to Mr. Bower, continue:
“The reason I’m asking is that I work for Kathy Flores, a well-known and respected insurance marketing expert. She puts out a weekly email newsletter that several thousand insurance agents receive, read, and enjoy. The only reason I’m calling is to ask Mr. Bower if he’d be open to us emailing him the weekly newsletter. Our readers tell us it takes about six minutes to read each one, and they are finding a lot of value in it. Can you connect me?”
Of course, if you’re connected with Mr. Bower right away, you’d use much the same language to convince him of the value of reading the email you’re requesting permission to send. (Don’t worry about legalities because by getting permission directly from Mr. Bower to send an opt-in email—and not just getting verbal permission and then…
